Home Price Increases Head East to Ocean Hill-Brownsville

It’s no secret that Brooklyn real estate prices have been on the rise since the Great Recession, which lasted from late 2007 to mid-2009. Central Brooklyn has been especially active, with properties going for record prices in Bedford-Stuyvesant and Crown Heights in the last two years. Brooklyn Deep has undertaken a detailed analysis of residential property sales – including homes, condominiums, co-ops and rental buildings – to better understand what this means for our neighborhoods.

Click on the map below to see how the average home price per census tract has changed.

BIG PICTURE BY NUMBERS

As housing prices rebounded after the crash, the average price per square foot for residential property has increased throughout the city. This change is most evident in the western portion of Central Brooklyn around Classon and Franklin Avenues, where the increasing popularity of neighborhoods such as Prospect Heights and Clinton Hill has begun to affect Bedford-Stuyvesant and Crown Heights. Heading east along Fulton Street and Atlantic Avenue, toward Lewis Avenue and Malcolm X Boulevard, significant increases have also occurred. These numbers are telling, but they’re also affected by high sale prices for individual buildings and fewer sales in specific tracts. For example, Brooklyn’s Census Tract 305 saw the largest percentage increase due in part to the 2014 sale of an eight-unit apartment building at 483 St. Marks Avenue for $16,000,000. A few census tracts saw smaller percentage changes – in some cases even negative changes. This was either due to relatively stable prices over time or a particularly low sale price skewing the numbers in a certain census tract.

Why does it matter?

While changes in price per square may not seem relevant to the average person’s life, they’re part of a trend that is affecting many Central Brooklynites. As building prices go up, rents go up. The people who are willing to pay these higher rents will also be willing to pay for more expensive groceries, restaurants and other services in the neighborhood. This trend will also make it more difficult for aspiring homeowners to buy property. Prices for two-family homes, the most common type of home sold in Central Brooklyn, are on the rise.

As housing prices climb even higher in the rest of Central Brooklyn, interest and activity has begun to move east. According to this data, Ocean Hill is keeping pace with citywide trends and has rebounded from a deep dip during the recession to match borough-wide sales. While Brownsville’s prices have remained relatively stable, that could soon change if Mayor de Blasio’s plans to rezone neighboring East New York for higher density are successful. Though sales activity in Bedford-Stuyvesant and Crown Heights is still very active, that will inevitably level out as the available inventory decreases. Based on the number of two-family homes sold over the last five years, Ocean Hill may be poised for an increase.

With relatively affordable prices, good access to transportation and close proximity to all of the new activity in Bedford-Stuyvesant and Crown Heights, Ocean Hill could soon become the next frontier in Brooklyn real estate’s eastward push.

Methodology: All data from NYC Department of Finance. Non-residential properties, properties with unrecorded square footage, properties sold for less than $10,000 and census tracts with too few sales were excluded. All prices adjusted for inflation to match 2014 numbers.

Share and Enjoy !

0Shares
0 0

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *